School officials says they’ve heard little on provincial plans and worry their programs are at risk

Luiz Lourenco, from Sao Paulo, Brazil, has been a Grade 11 student at Riverside secondary school in Port Coquitlam.

Photograph by: Jason Payne
, VANCOUVER SUN

Tougher rules to protect B.C.’s reputation for quality education are part of a Liberal plan to boost the province’s share of international students.

The plan aims to bring thousands more children from abroad into public and private K-12 schools in B.C., in the hope they will eventually make Canada their home.

Education Minister Don McRae said better standards are necessary because a single gaffe could seriously undermine provincial efforts to attract more fee-paying students in a highly competitive market.

“If we have one bad story internationally, it really hurts opportunities,” he said in an interview.

School trustees and others are worried about what the government is planning — especially because discussions have involved only a small group of people meeting in private. Details leaked to The Vancouver Sun suggest sweeping changes are being contemplated, including a per-student provincial surcharge of $100 to $250, limits on the number of students attending any one school and a standard provincewide tuition fee.

School districts, which have developed international education programs over many years, have been setting their own fees and reaping the benefits. The average fee in public schools is $12,135 a year and total tuition revenues across the province last year reached almost $139 million. Coquitlam and Vancouver school districts were the big winners, collecting about $14 million each.

While some programs are highly successful, there are problems. A recent report on a Vancouver Island program identified cases of overspending, poor oversight and questionable contracts, and raised concerns about the number of young Korean students crowded into two single-family homes used as dormitories.

But many trustees think the programs have been working well overall and they weren’t pleased to learn that the Education Ministry has been drafting changes before talking to them.

“In our view, nothing will proceed until school trustees have been engaged in the discussion and agree (about) what needs to be done,” said Michael McEvoy, president of the B.C. School Trustees’ Association.

He said tuition discrepancies have been discussed among trustees for some time, but he was unaware of the broad proposals, drafted by the ministry in consultation with its new K-12 international education advisory group. “Those were a surprise to me,” he said.

The Sun’s reporting of those proposals raised other eyebrows as well. “We have heard nothing. Zero,” said Patti Bacchus, chairwoman of the Vancouver board of education. “All the information I have so far is (the Sun’s) news story.... I’m not sure that reflects well on the co-governance relationships that we are supposed to have between the Ministry of Education and local school boards.”

Although the proposals are sweeping, McEvoy said the ministry has assured him they are preliminary and trustees will be consulted. “Without trustee sign-off, in our view this is not going anywhere,” he said.

During an interview, McRae said the review of international education programs in B.C. is at an early stage and everything is “on the table.”

But reforms for the 34 schools the province licenses overseas — mostly in China — will be announced next month, he said.

Susan Lambert, president of the B.C. Teachers’ Federation (BCTF), has also been watching developments with concern and is particularly critical of the overseas school program, which is believed to be a money maker for the private school owners but creates no revenue for the province.

The in-B.C. international programs, on the other hand, do provide a benefit for B.C. students because they promote cultural awareness and cross-cultural friendships, she said. There are also monetary advantages for districts that have successful programs.

But there are problems. Some international students have little or no English and are in B.C. for only a short stay, which means English language learning courses, also known as ESL, have to be modified for them, Lambert said. Others are living in B.C. without family support and require counselling services that are in short supply.

Although schools may get a portion of the revenue from international students, she said more counselling services for them generally means less for B.C. students.

There have been concerns, too, about a growing number of foreign families who bring their special-needs children to Metro schools so they can attend regular classes with same-age students rather than being segregated or denied education altogether in their homelands. That places pressures on schools and teachers, especially when the children speak no English. And, in some cases, parents refuse to reveal their special learning needs.

Sylvia Helmer, an instructor with the University of B.C.’s education faculty, raised a red flag about this in 2010. Since then, the stress on resources has worsened, she said Friday.

About 10,000 international students attend B.C. public K-12 schools, while almost 3,000 are enrolled in private schools. In total, there are 94,000 international students in B.C. (K-12, public and private post-secondary institutions and language schools) and about 8,000 students studying in B.C. overseas schools in the hope of graduating with a B.C. diploma.

Premier Christy Clark has said she wants an additional 47,000 students in B.C. schools over the next four years, including 6,000 more in K-12 schools. She’s expressed the hope that many of these students will choose to stay in B.C. after finishing their education, thereby easing the province’s skills shortage.

While many Metro districts, especially those with declining enrolments, are keen to respond, rural schools have more difficulty attracting students from abroad. Last year, about a dozen rural and remote school districts had no international student revenue and several more earned only small sums, resulting in educational inequities around the province.

That situation would be exacerbated if the ministry orders a standard tuition fee, Lambert said. “We already know that it’s lopsided, in that West Van and Vancouver can attract international students far better than Stikine and Gold Trail.”

A standardized fee would likely mean even more students would opt for urban schools, she said.

She’s also troubled by the time and energy consumed by international programs, which she said detracts from other priorities. “We know we have major needs right here — we have poverty, special education, cyberbullying. We have lots of things that we should be spending our physical and human resources on here.... Should we really diversify our effort to include a mandate to provide (foreign) graduates into post-secondary?”

Economists insist the pursuit of international students is worth it. A recent report by Roslyn Kunin & Associates suggests that international students in Canada in 2010 spent more than $7.7 billion on tuition, accommodation and goods, created thousands of jobs and generated almost half a billion dollars in government revenue.

According to its jobs strategy, the B.C. government will play a lead role in marketing the province’s schools abroad. “The province will advance a variety of actions, such as legislation or new regulations on quality assurance, to help ensure all students, no matter where they come from or where they choose to study, can be confident in B.C.’s quality education,” it states.

After the release of the strategy, then education minister George Abbott established the K-12 international education advisory group. McRae, the current minister, said that doesn’t mean the ministry wants more oversight of international education, adding that’s still under discussion.

The man who launched the first international education program in B.C. and made it a success in West Vancouver where he was superintendent said he fears government meddling will have disastrous consequences.

“This is a school-district created idea, it’s been very successful ... and now the ministry wants to grab the cash,” Doug Player said Friday, referring to the proposal for a per-student surcharge.

Bureaucrats should leave the programs alone, he said adding: “I don’t know any district that doesn’t take great care with their program because the funds are so important.”

Player, now a consultant, was hired recently to review international education programs in Qualicum and Cowichan Valley. His report to the Qualicum school board identified several problems, including hefty salaries for contractors without evidence their work was productive, excessive travel costs, a questionable contract giving an outsider responsibility for Korean students and a failure to conduct criminal record checks for some homestay families.

But he praised the Qualicum trustees, saying their request for a thorough review shows they are serious about quality.

Robin Austin, the NDP education critic, said international education programs are not at the top of his agenda and wouldn’t comment in detail, except to say his party, if it forms government in May, would consult widely before making any changes.

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